Tentering machine



1e 25, 1% LACEY TENTERING MACHINE Filed NOV. 16, 1939 5 Sheets-Sheet l INVENTOR, Harold ace 5 4 ATTORNEY.

June 25, 1940. H. LACEY 2,205,749

TENTERING MACHINE Filed NOV. 16, 1939 3 Sheets-Sheet 2 INVENTOR, flan-old 14 62 ATTORNEY.

TENTERING MACHINE Filed Nov. 16, 1939 3 Sheets-Shet 3 INVENTOR, fla roZaZ 231 5/ ATTORNEY.

Patented June 25, 194% UNITED srAJ'rEs Harold Lacey, Haledon,

son Machine Company,

TENTERING MACHINE N. 1., assigncr to Morri- Paterson, N. J., acorporation of New Jersey Applica ion November 16, 1939, Serial-No. 304,753

4 Claims.

This invention relates to tentering machines whose tentering or stretching means comprises two endless chains arranged in the same plane and side by side but spaced apart so as to admit the cloth between their adjoining stretches, the chains being caused to travel each circuitously of itself and so that the said two stretches move in the same direction though so as to undergo some initial diversion and thus effect the tentering or 1 stretching of the cloth (see Ramsey PatentNo.

1,576,220, for-instance). Each chain is composed of links formed as clips to grip the cloth,

or each with a: body portion providing a surface on whichthe corresponding edge portion of the cloth comes to rest as the cloth enters between the inner or adjoining stretches of the chains and a pivoted jaw which thereon is ali lowed to fall against said cloth edge portion to coact with said surface to efiect the grip, such jaw being retracted to free the cloth when the clip attains the delivery end of the corresponding stretch. Each chain extends around two sprocket-wheels, one at the intake and the other at the delivery end of the machine, and at such ends, concentric with the sprocket-wheels, are disk-shaped openers which usually turn in unison with the respective sprocket-wheels and each of which, while a clip is traveling around the corresponding sprocket-wheel, holds retracted the 1) movable jaw of such clip and the clip thus in open state. During each cycle of its movement as a part of the chain each clip is thus twice held open by the openers and twice closed, existing closed each time it is within one of the two stretches of the chain which lie between the sprocket-wheels. When it is allowed to fall by the opener at the entering end of the machine it falls on the cloth, but when it is allowed to fall by the opener at the delivery end of the machine it falls onto the bare plate of the clip and since the jaw must be somewhat heavy in orderto effeet a good grip this results in dulling thefotherwise sharp edges of the jaws, wherefore the jaws have to be frequently removed and resharpened, thus temporarily putting the machine out of commission; eventually, moreover, the plates become indented by the jaws and repair in this respect is difficult because usually the plates are prac- 50 tically integral parts of the body portions of the clips.

The object of this invention is so to construct the machine that the movable jaws, instead of being permitted to fall abruptly, as against the 55 bare plates, must fall gradually, thus, for instance, to preserve themselves and against undue wear.

In the drawings I show my invention applied to only one of the cloth-gripping systems of the machine. Therein:

Fig. l is a plan, clips shown;

Fig. 2 is a left-hand elevation; and

Fig. 3 is a view mainly in longitudinal section.

I is the pair of parallel rails and 2 the circular head to which said rails are rigidly affixed, these being as usual and the rails and head being suitably channeled and otherwise shaped for guiding the corresponding chain of clips. The side 15 of this structure which is the nearer to the observer in Fig. 1 is the relatively inner side or that along which the clips, closed, travel in clothgripping state. The head affords a bearing 3 for a vertical shaft i on which is keyed a sprocket-wheel 5 around and in engagement with which the endless clip-chain. extends. The latter comprises the usual clips pivotally interconnected (see Ramsey Patent No. 2,096,470). The body part 8 of each clip has plate or jaw 6a and pivoted to the body part on a horizontal axis above the plate is the movable jaw 6h having an upstanding retracting arm to; gravity tends to cause the jaw to fall against the plate. The head and element l--5 shown are at the delivery end of the machine and are usually duplicated at the entering end. Usually at each end of the machine, above and usually rotated. in unison with the corresponding element l- 5, there is the mentioned opener concentric 1 with said element, the same being a disk-like part of greater diameter than the arcuate path which the arms to tend (due to gravity acting on the jaws 6b) to follow, wherefore as each clip travels around the element l-E' its jaw is moved @1 10 to open position by the opener, falling to closed position when it departs therefrom. Such an opener may be retained, according to my invention, at the entering end of the structure I2. But at the delivery end, as shown, the opening is efiected by novel means which insures that the ensuing closing shall be gradual instead of so abrupt as to involve sudden and thus harmful impact of the jaws with the plates of the clips.

Assume that, as in Fig. l, the arms 60 of the clips follow the parallel paths "B when the clips, closed, are traveling in the straight stretches of the chain existing between the sprocket-wheels. According to previous. constructions both openers, each of the indicated diameter to cause the the plates 4 air with only the arms of the a fixed cloth-supporting hearings, on

respective clips from necessary radial displacement of the arms 60 in order to shift to open position the movable jaws of clips reaching the openers, had their axes coincident with a vertical plane parallel with and midway between such paths. But according to this invention the opener at the delivery end of the machine has its axis offset to one side of said plane, that is,'beyond the path I of the arms 6c of the clips in the inner one of said stretches, or-those clips which are approaching the opener in closed state. of such diameter that, whereas it projects beyond said inner path 1 the other or outer path I is substantially tangent to the perimeter of the opener. Therefore, whereas the clips will undergo the desired quick opening when they attain the opener, the closing thereof must ensue gradually during their half-circular travel with their arms 3c engaged therewith, being completely closed when they are about to begin their travel in the outer path 1.

Such opener is designated 8 and is here an inverted dish-shaped disk. It is above element 45 and has bearings at 9, preferably balla shaft H! which is eccentric in the respect above indicated relatively to shaft 4 and is fast in an arm I! which overhangs element 4-5 and the opener and is itself fast to the two rails and so forms a part of the fixed structure of the machine. Preferably, as is usual, the opener should be rotated in unison with the element 4- 5, and for this purpose there is fast to shaft 4 a crank l2 under the opener and with which the latter is engaged, here in the following manner: A post I3 "depends from and is fast to the opener and this has journaled thereon, as by a ball-bearing I 4, a roller I5. The crank has a radial slot lZa which receives said roller, permitting it the necessary radial displacement relatively to the crank due to the eccentricity of their paths of motion. What is broadly material is that the jawengaged surface of the opener shall substantially conform in shape, and also in extent to at least, a semi-circle and on the one hand have the path 1 which the jaws follow in the movement of the the rebend in the chain related to such perimeter approximately as a tangentand on the other hand be cut by a straight line forming an extension of the path 7 which the jaws follow in the movement of the respective clips toward the rebend. In short,

so long as theseconditions exist it is not necessary that the opener be revoluble, nor that its diameter should, as shown, be but somewhat greater than that of what I term the semi-circular false course (Fig. 1) which the clip jaws (to wit, their arms to) tend to follow in their travel around the element 45, or from one path I to the other.

The opener might bestationary excepting that it is known in practice that in that case there is an undue wear both of the opener and the jaws of the clips. It is here made to revolve in the same direction in which the system including the traveling chain moves by engaging it with said system, here by intercoupling it with the rotary element -5 forming a part of such system.

And this opener is In the appended claims the surface referred to is in the example set forth the perimeter of the opener.

Having thus fully described my invention, what I claim is:

1. Cloth tentering mechanism including, with supporting means, a traveling chain of clips carried by said means and having normally closed openable jaws, and means for guiding the chain and maintaining a substantially semi-circular rebend therein, a substantially circular opener carried by the supporting means and revoluble around its own axis, and having its perimeter arranged to be engaged, by said jaws and hold them open during travel of the respective clips through the rebend and which perimeter on the one hand has the path which the jaws follow in the movement of the respective clips from the rebend related to such perimeter approximately as a tangent and on out by a straight line forming an extension of the path which the jaws follow in the movement of the respective clips toward the rebend.

2. Cloth tentering mechanism including, with supporting means, a traveling chain of clips carried by said means and having normally closed openable jaws, and means for guiding the chain and maintaining a substantially semi-circular rebend therein, a substantially circular opener carried by the supporting movement of the respective clips toward the rebend.

3. In a tentering machine, the combination, with a traveling chain of clips having normally closed openable jaws and means for guiding the chain including a rotary element maintaining a substantially semi-circular rebend therein, of an opener revoluble in said means above the chain and rotated by said element in unison therewith and defining a substantially circular surface arranged to be progressively engaged by said jaws during travel of the clips through said rebend, said opener having the axis around which said surface is described eccentric of the axis of said element and the path which the jaws follow in the movement of the respective clips from said to said surface approximately as a tangent and also having said surface cut by a straight line forming an extension of the path which the jaws follow in the movement of the respective clips toward said element.

4, The combination set forth in claim 3 characterized by one of the parts formed by said element and opener having a substantially radial slot and the other a projection engaged in the slot and thereby intercoupling said parts for rota 

